Oklahoma City mayor leads city leaders to press lawmakers on issues important to Americans

Oklahoma City mayor leads city leaders to press lawmakers on issues important to Americans

Oklahoma City Mayor Mick Cornett

OKLAHOMA CITY – Oklahoma City’s mayor led several other city leaders from across the country to Washington to press lawmakers on issues that are important to Americans.

Oklahoma City Mayor Mick Cornett serves as the president of the U.S. Conference of Mayors. Recently, he led a bipartisan delegation of more than 30 mayors to Washington to push lawmakers to focus on issues that will really improve communities across the country.

“If you look at current budget proposals, they don’t add up and we have yet to see much detail on how this work will be accomplished. As Washington talks about proposed spending increases, we know the only place cuts can come from are the things that we use to actually protect our cities and residents,” said New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu.

Mayors stressed that they support comprehensive immigration reform, the retention of patient-protection provisions in the Affordable Care Act and the preservation of municipal bonds and grants for lower-income residents.

“Last year, 95 percent of the jobs and more than 91 percent of the country’s Gross Domestic Product was generated in cities and metropolitan areas,” said USCM CEO and Executive Director Tom Cochran. “As goes cities, so goes the nation. So the Administration and Congress have a vested interest in the future of America’s cities. Mayors are here this week, and will keep returning, to make sure they understand this.”

The group stressed concerns about the administration’s executive orders on travel bans and immigration, including the implementation that is impacting immigrants who have been in the United States their entire lives and have not committed crimes.\

“While immigration has become a divisive issue across the country, it is not among the nation’s mayors. We recognize what immigrants have contributed to our country,” Cornett said.